Free Republic University, Department of History presents World War II Plus 70 Years: Seminar and Discussion Forum First session: September 1, 2009. Last date to add: September 2, 2015. Reading assignment: New York Times articles delivered daily to students on the 70th anniversary of original publication date. (Previously posted articles can be found by searching on keyword realtime Or view Homers posting history .) To add this class to or drop it from your schedule notify Admissions and Records (Attn: Homer_J_Simpson) by freepmail. Those on the Realtime +/- 70 Years ping list are automatically enrolled. Course description, prerequisites and tuition information is available at the bottom of Homers profile. Also visit our general discussion thread.

Selections from West Point Atlas for the Second World War Papua, New Guinea, 1942 The Solomons: Guadalcanal and Florida, 1942 Southwest Russia, 1942: Soviet Winter Offensive, Operations, 19 November-12 December 1942 North Africa, 1941: Pursuit to Tunisia, November 1942-February 1943 Tunisia 1942: The Race for Tunisia-Situation 1 January 1943, and Operations Since 17 November 1942 The Far East and the Pacific, 1941: Status of Forces and Allied Theater Boundaries, 2 July 1942 India-Burma, 1942: Allied Lines of Communication, 1942-1943

2
posted on 12/12/2012 5:21:53 AM PST
by Homer_J_Simpson
("Every nation has the government that it deserves." - Joseph de Maistre (1753-1821))

Note the small item titled Father Riker Cleared, on page 2. The lawyer who told the jury that William Riker may be a little goofy was Melvin Belli. For extra credit I recommend doing a search on William E. Riker of Holy City fame.

Note the small item titled Father Riker Cleared, on page 2. The lawyer who told the jury that William Riker may be a little goofy was Melvin Belli. For extra credit I recommend doing a search on William E. Riker of Holy City fame.

On the Eastern Front... Operation Winter Storm. German Field Marshal Manstein begins his attack to relieve the forces in the Stalingrad pocket in the south near Kotelnikovo. His forces are comprised of 13 divisions including 3 panzer units. The Soviet 51st Army is defending the area. Farther north the German forces have fought to within 25 miles of the trapped 6th Army, they will get no closer. Once the attack begins, the Soviets quickly move the 2nd Guards Army to take up positions on the Myshova River, however it takes several days for them to arrive and the 51st holds off the German attack alone.

In Tunisia... Four ships are sunk in the Algiers Harbor by Italian midget submarines. Heavy fighting continues near Medjez el Bab.

8
posted on 12/12/2012 5:32:49 AM PST
by Homer_J_Simpson
("Every nation has the government that it deserves." - Joseph de Maistre (1753-1821))

FRANCE: Bordeaux: Four merchant ships, one tanker and a naval auxiliary moored in Bourdeaux, 60 miles from the sea, erupted this morning as limpet mines stuck to their hulls by British canoe commandos blew up. Royal Marine raiders had paddled 81 miles through Europe’s most dangerous estuary in icy conditions, for five nights, to reach their target. There is no plan to recover survivors. Initially five heavily-laden canoes carrying ten men were left submarine ten miles south of the Gironde estuary. They had to paddle north, round Pointe de Grave and then south down the Gironde, through tidal races. The first casualties were swept away in heavy seas offshore and taken prisoner. Near the Pointe, five-foot waves capsized a second two-man canoe. The men clung to other cockles, but had to be ordered to let go, a death sentence in such cold water. One whispered: “That’s all right sir, I understand.” In the river mouth a third canoe was swept off course.

Two cockles and four men survived to attack the fast merchant-men vital to Bordeaux’s supply line. The men were Major Hasler, aged 28, his partner, Marine Sparks, and Corporal Laver with Marine Mills. Hidden in riverside reeds by day, they moved with the floodtide by night. In conditions likely to cause hypothermia they slipped alongside their targets, with nine hours to escape. If captured on the way to neutral Spain they will be shot.

GERMANY: Berlin: The State Opera House, bombed by the British last year, reopens with a performance of Wagner’s Die Meistersinger.
U-219 commissioned

Stalingrad: Field Marshal von Manstein has decided to make his relief attack for Stalingrad near Kotelnikovo, some 60 miles south-west of the city, even though he has a point near Nizhne Chirskaya that is closer to Stalingrad, but to attack from here would involve a crossing of the Don which von Manstein regards as too risky. The German code name for this operation is “Wintergewitter” (Winter Storm). General Hoth is in tactical command of the operation which starts today.
Hoth’s 4th Panzer Army, part of which is trapped in Stalingrad, is spearheading the attack from Kotelnikovo.

Von Manstein, ordered to “recapture the positions previously occupied by us”, describes his operation as a “race with death”, and there is no doubt that the Sixth Army is doomed if he loses. The Luftwaffe has failed the impossible task set it by Goering’s boast to Hitler that he could keep the trapped army supplied. Heinkel He-111 bombers have been pressed into service as transports, but Russian fighters are taking a heavy toll.

The Germans in the Stalingrad pocket are hungry and cold. They are eating their horses; some freeze to death, and it is doubtful if they have enough fuel to break out.

Yet the beleaguered General Paulus is making no effort to link up with Hoth’s advancing tanks, which are making good progress. He will not abandon the ruins of Stalingrad until Hitler gives him permission - and Hitler will never do that.

MEDITERRANEAN SEA: S class submarine HMS P.222 (the only one of her class not to be named) is located by Italian destroyer Fortunale which was escorting a convoy to Tunis and depth charged to destruction off Capri. There are no survivors (Alex Gordon)(108)

NORTH AFRICA: Italian midget submarines sink for ships in the harbour at Algiers.

Italian frogmen rode into Algiers harbour last night on their two-man underwater chariots, sank two merchantmen and damaged two others.

Despite the clear reluctance of many Italian soldiers to fight alongside the Germans - which led to world contempt in their 1940 desert campaign - the bravery of these frogmen, who have sunk or damaged ships in Gibraltar and Alexandria and during the Crete landings, is much admired by the Royal Navy which has had to take special precautions, including the use of concussion grenades.

The fighting at Medjez el Bab continues.

Beaten but not unbowed, the Afrika Korps, has not lost its ability to sting. The regrouped and replenished Eighth Army has met fierce resistance from the retreating Axis at Mersa Brega, with Rommel ducking a strong right hook by New Zealand tanks. The going has not been easy for the Allies. The road to Tripoli is carpeted with mines and booby traps. In the west, Free French forces and the British 1st Guards Brigade have driven off strong Axis counter-attacks at Medje el Bab, but German reinforcements are flooding into Tunis.

U.S.A.: A secret memorandum by Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff General George C. Marshall contains instructions on how to handle Latin Americans of German descent. “There interned nationals are to be used for exchange with interned American civilian nationals.” (Mike Yared)

"Jewish prisoners at a labor camp in Lutsk, Ukraine, armed with knives, bricks, iron bars, acid, and several revolvers and sawed-off shotguns, revolt against Germans and Ukrainians. The uprising is crushed. "

Kurt Gerstein

"Kurt Gerstein remains an enigma. A devout Christian with backgrounds in medicine and engineering, he joined the Nazi Party in 1933. Three years later he was dismissed for anti-Nazi activity and sentenced to a concentration camp.

"After the murder of his sister-in-law during the "euthanasia" program, Gerstein wanted to learn the truth about such killings. He joined the Waffen-SS in 1941 and studied the effects of Zyklon B. Gerstein became head of the Technical Disinfection Department within the Institute of Hygiene.

"However, when he was ordered to transport killing agent Zyklon B to camps, he witnessed the mass killings of Jews by carbon monoxide at Belzec. Horrified, Gerstein resolved to tell the world, approaching diplomats, church leaders, and even the papal nuncio in Berlin--but with little success.

"Arrested by the French at the end of the war, Gerstein was imprisoned as a suspected war criminal. He died mysteriously, probably a suicide but perhaps at the hands of SS officers who feared his testimony."

"The Germans extended their antisemitic policies to the parts of North Africa under their control. These Tunisian Jews march off to engage in forced labor. Relatively few North African Jews perished in the Holocaust, however, because the Allies conquered the region before the Nazis had the opportunity to begin a systematic program of extermination."

"Considering their subjects only as research tools, not humans, Nazi medical experimenters put no ethical limits on their activities. As with the prisoner whose leg is pictured here, some inmates were injected with pus and toxic substances in order to generate infections on which various experimental medicines could be tested. Nazi researchers also amputated healthy limbs for transplant to soldiers who had been severely wounded. Few prisoners survived the experiments, either dying immediately or becoming so weakened and ill that they were soon consigned to the gas chambers."

"Proudly posing in the regalia of an SS officer, Max Koegel found his career within the Nazi bureaucracy. Like many German soldiers after World War I, he had difficulty adjusting to civilian life. In 1926 Koegel served time in prison for bankruptcy and fraud, and in 1929 his frustrations led him to join the SS. He served on the staff of the Dachau concentration camp in 1933 and progressed from there through a variety of camp positions, including posts as the commandant of the Ravensbrück concentration camp and, beginning in 1942, the Majdanek death camp."

Disclaimer:
Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual
posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its
management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the
exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.